Now that which is created must, as we affirm, of necessity be
created by a cause. But the father and maker of all this universe is
past finding out; and even if we found him, to tell of him to all men
would be impossible. And there is still a question to be asked about
him: Which of the patterns had the artificer in view when he made the
world-the pattern of the unchangeable, or of that which is created? If
the world be indeed fair and the artificer good, it is manifest that
he must have looked to that which is eternal; but if what cannot be
said without blasphemy is true, then to the created pattern. Every one
will see that he must have looked to, the eternal; for the world is
the fairest of creations and he is the best of causes. And having been
created in this way, the world has been framed in the likeness of that
which is apprehended by reason and mind and is unchangeable, and must
therefore of necessity, if this is admitted, be a copy of something. (...)